By Lauren McCue
CSULA YAF’s scheduled event with Ben Shapiro has rocked the campus to
its progressive core, thrusting the school into a state of uproar
since being announced last month. But the situation on campus is
getting increasingly serious as leftists are beginning to organize, with
one choosing to issue a troubling threat on Facebook.

Shapiro’s speech, scheduled to take place on February 25, will address the topic, “When Diversity Becomes A Problem”.

Last
night on Facebook, #BlackLivesMatter activist and CSULA Professor
Melina Abdullah, who has recently come under criticism for making
radical calls to #AbolishThePolice, posted a call for action to counter
Shapiro’s event being hosted by CSULA Young Americans for Freedom (YAF).

Abdullah is also spreading fabricated rumors that conservatives
are threatening to bring guns to the event. Despite multiple claims of
such threats, CSULA YAF and Young America’s Foundation have been unable
to uncover any evidence.

The only threats with supporting evidence have come from leftists, including Professor Robert Donald Weide who challenged conservative students to a wrestling match, telling one commenter, “I lift, bro.” He also cryptically threatened to “macroaggress” campus conservatives in a bizarre message on his office door.

In
the comments following Abdullah’s post, one person chose to issue a
real and credible threat to Ben Shapiro, writing, “ [he] won’t be
talking or lookin so nice no more” after the event.

The incidents leading up to CSULA YAF’s event with Ben Shapiro
showcase the true intolerance of the Left on college campuses. CSULA YAF
has taken it upon themselves to do what the school has neglected:
promote diversity of thought. Coddled campus liberals at CSULA do not
know how to handle ONE conservative speaker so they resort to spreading
false statements, and shutting down anyone who disagrees with them.

It
is even more troubling that Abdullah, a CSULA professor, is working to
hold a counter rally by encouraging students to “turn up” and shut down
the event.UPDATE
Leftists on campus have announced their counter rally in opposition
of Ben Shapiro's speech. These leftists don't seem to realize they are
underscoring Ben's point by holding a counter rally and not calmly
listening to his views. That is probably asking too much of most
liberals nowadays.

Lauren McCue is Program Officer for Chapter Services at Young America's Foundation.

RESTON,
VA– On Monday evening, the president of California State University Los
Angeles (CSULA) officially canceled CSULA Young Americans for Freedom's
(YAF) lecture by Ben Shapiro, which was scheduled to take place on
Thursday, February 25, citing the need to organize a more “inclusive”
event.
This is a clear violation of student rights. Thus Shapiro and YAF
plan to appear on campus, along with a camera crew, at the originally
scheduled time of 2:00 PM PST at the USU Theater and the university can
use its security force to force conservatives to shut up if they feel so
threatened by the free exchange of ideas. Shapiro told YAF, “This is
what the climate of campus fascism has wrought: jackbooted students who
believe they can strong-arm the administration into shutting down
dissent, and an administration willing to shut down that dissent to
kowtow to these precious snowflakes. The campus left are not just
cowards, they’re totalitarians. We’re not going to stand for it.”

In
an email to the chairman of CSULA YAF, university president William
Covino wrote, “After careful consideration, I have decided that it will
be best for our campus community if we reschedule Ben Shapiro’s
appearance for a later date, so that we can arrange for him to appear as
part of a group of speakers with differing viewpoints on diversity.”

Covino
continued, “Such an event will better represent our university’s
dedication to the free exchange of ideas and the value of considering
multiple viewpoints.”

Contrary to Covino’s newfound love for the
“free exchange of ideas” and the consideration of “multiple
viewpoints,” his university has hosted a wide variety of radical liberal
speakers without ever bothering to ensure the conservative worldview
was represented.

For convenience, we’ve sampled a few choice examples from recent years below:
• Dr. Cornel West addressed “Post Racialism”
• Alia al-Saji spoke on "Cultural Racism: Muslim Veiling, Embodiment, and the Nature of Culture”
• Kimberlé Crenshaw addressed "Racing to Post Racialism: Critical Race Theory, Constitutional Law, and Sustaining Communities"
• Serene Khader lectured on the topic, "Do Muslim Women Really Need Freedom?"
• Angela Davis and Tim Wise will address in a video lecture “Exploring Whiteness” this Wednesday
Did Covino go out of his way to ensure students attending any one of
these events had the opportunity to “consider multiple viewpoints?” Has
he ever canceled other events for failing to meet his standard of
“inclusivity?”

Only conservatives are subject to liberal
administrators’ obstructionist tactics to promote progressivism at the
expense of any modicum of ideological diversity. This is a clear-cut
case study in that disturbing pattern.

Young America’s
Foundation is sickened by Covino’s cowardly decision to censor his own
student’s event. After the student budget board approved Shapiro’s
lecture two separate times, Covino ignored their decision and caved to
the demands of radical professors such as Dr. Robert Weide and Black
Lives Matter activist Melina Abdullah. Weide made national news earlier
this year for challenging CSULA YAF supporters to wrestle him over their
decision to host the Shapiro event.

CSULA students have said the event poses a “threat to their lives” and is “damaging to their mental health.”

In
recognition of the school’s dire need for ideological diversity, Young
America’s Foundation and CSULA YAF, in cooperation with Ben Shapiro,
fully intend to hold the event, which is part of YAF’s Fred R. Allen
Lecture Series, without the university’s approval. The Foundation is
prepared to take legal action if the school fails to recognize these
students’ rights.

For more information, to schedule an interview, or to cover this story, contact Emily Jashinsky at ejashinsky@yaf.org.